Review Category: Movie

Mark Jenkin’s 2019 debut Bait was a drama about the effects of tourism on a Cornish fishing village, but its intense, gritty style drew many comparisons to horror. Jenkin has more deliberately leaned into the genre for his follow-up feature; Enys Men – the title means ‘Stone Island’ – is a Cornish folk horror.

In 1973, a woman (Mary Woodvine) lives alone on a remote island. Daily, she measures the soil temperature under a particular patch of flowers; her repeated notation of “no change” may refer to the state of the flowers but also sums up the way her routine is presented across the first half of the movie.

However, not all is as it seems. From a radio report indicating that 1973 is long past to a boat sunk in the nineteenth century reappearing in contemporary form, the timeline of events surrounding this island doesn’t add up. But the woman seems oblivious to this, until the appearance of mysterious lichen, growing not just on the flowers but on her own body, finally stirs her to record a change.

The film doesn’t give answers, but relishes in the ambiguity. Is she lost in her isolated mind, or haunted by the island’s ghosts? Or perhaps she’s one of them, captured in the crackly celluloid of Jenkin’s 16mm film? The footage appears patched together from unearthed ‘70s film, and the experimental style – many close-ups, jarring editing, minimal dialogue – creates an at-times overwhelming sense of eeriness.

But whereas Bait used this style to complement an impactful and relevant narrative, with Enys Men, the end result feels a little like the character – lost and in need of purpose.

Enys Men is released in UK cinemas on January 13th 2023.

Martin McDonagh reunites his In Bruges dream team – Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell – in a film that’s as funny, powerful, and profound as its 2008 predecessor even though it’s largely cut from an entirely different dramatic cloth. It’s 1923 and the tiny, remote island of Inisherin – a cold, bleak place whose stony-faced inhabitants live in stone-walled houses and cottages – exists away from but on the fringes of the Irish Civil War raging on the nearby mainland. Padraic Suilleabhain (Farrell) is baffled and distressed when his long-time friend and drinking buddy, local folk musician Colm Doherty (Gleeson) announces that he no longer wants to speak to his old friend as he doesn’t like him anymore. Padraic can’t understand what’s changed and what he’s done to offend and he refuses the advice of his patient sister Siobhan (Kerry Condon) and troubled local lad Dominic (Barry Keoghan) to accept the situation and just get on with his life. Colm – who spends much of his time gazing out to sea and working on a new and definitive folk song – becomes exasperated by Padraic’s constant attempts to rebuild bridges and eventually he tells him that every time Padraic bothers him or talks to him he will cut off one of his own left fingers with a pair of sheep shears.

The Banshees of Inisherin is, at its heart, a story of aching loneliness and the fragility of friendship and the inevitability of our own mortality. Padraic just wants life to carry on as he’s always known it, his restless sister Siobhan at his side and his best drinking buddy Colm never far away. Colm, though, has become aware of the butterfly nature of human life, obsessed with leaving something behind that will be remembered and no longer willing to spend time with people who don’t fulfil him. It’s achingly poignant watching Padraic plunged into despair at the loss of his friend and Colm turning his back on a friend he has presumably known all his life. The parallels between the collapse of the pair’s relationship and the war being fought just over the horizon speak for themselves.

Yet The Banshees of Inisherin is frequently absolutely hilarious, laugh out loud funny. Padraic – possibly Farrel’s finest performance – is a simple soul completely at sea when his world is turned upside down and convinced that his persistence will put things right. Barry Keoghan is a simple soul but he’s an oddly wise head on young shoulders; he sees things as they are, in black and white with no shades of grey and he often provides much of the film’s broadest humour despite the dark underbelly of his own life, living with his father, brutish local Police officer Peadar Kearney (Gary Lydon) who physically and sexually abuses him. Gleeson is superb, of course, a man of few words, a forbidding, giant bear of a man who has made up his mind and will not be turned. Kerry Condon’s delightful Siobhan is the voice of reason but even she can only take so much of life on the barren, insular island with its quirky roll call of eccentrics.

The Banshees of Inisherin is a powerful, thoughtful, beautifully-photographed piece that will make you laugh uproariously one minute before turning on a dime and bringing a tear to your eye. It’s worlds away from the sort of fare we tend to take for granted at our multiplexes and it’s a reminder that some of the very best stories are about ordinary folk living ordinary lives with all the humour and drama and tragedy that comes with just being alive. Outstanding.

THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN is in cinemas now.

When two strangers find that they have accidentally booked into the same Airbnb on the same night, a horrifying discovery is made. And not just a concerning lack of toilet paper in the bathroom. Is the outwardly genial but odd-in-ways-you-can’t-quite-put-your-finger-on Keith (Bill Skarsgård) all that he seems to be? Searching for said loo roll in the basement, Tess (Georgina Campbell) stumbles across – no, wait, we’ve said too much already.

From unassuming beginnings, writer and director Zach Cregger spins the year’s most shocking horror film. There are comparisons to be made to the likes of Martyrs, Malignant and even Psycho, should one care to look for them, but his Barbarian is a beast of its own, packing a series of vicious surprises up its (tightly buttoned, well-tailored) sleeve.

The questions quickly rack up. Do Keith’s smiles and apparent good manners hide something more sinister? Is Tess the innocent heroine she at first appears to be? What is Justin Long doing here, after all these years of Justin Long not being in much at all? Where does Richard Brake fit in, and will he be playing the kind of monster he usually does, in this sort of thing? And what is this sort of thing, anyway? All of which will be answered, and we’ll let the film do its own talking.

Cregger layers suspense on suspense, from the initial anxieties of Tess and Bill’s predicament – pregnant with tension and unspoken fears – to the film’s more traditional genre flourishes. In its menfolk, the film taps into the inherent perils of womanhood, both subtle and more overt. The themes may be timely, but they’re also timeless (especially if you happen to be a woman, navigating the creeps of today), and in service of something startlingly unpredictable and original.

At the same time, the film impresses with a strain of cleverly employed gallows humour, puncturing the tension and scares with much-needed levity. Perhaps Long threatens to push the whole thing into all-out comedy, but it’s a deliciously slimy performance from one of horror’s more underappreciated figures. Campbell will likely have audiences screaming at their screens where some of her character’s decision-making is concerned, but the actress is a grounding presence, and a sympathetic straight woman to the Skarsgård-isms and wacky Justin Long behaviour.

To say more would be to spoil one of the year’s wildest releases. What we can say: Barbarian is a rollicking genre ride into the unexpected, the unsettling and the unforgettable.

Barbarian is in UK cinemas from October 28th.

Black Adam is a mess. Dwayne Johnson’s decade-in-the-making debut as ancient powerhouse Teth-Adam is earnest but sloppy, a misguided attempt at an origin story that never feels as potent as it wants to be.  The result is a film that feels more like the comic book movie equivalent of an inside joke than an accessible crowd-pleaser.

5,000 years ago, through a series of events outside his control, Teth-Adam became the champion of Kahndaq. He freed his people from an oppressive regime and… went to sleep. Now, in present-day Kahndaq, a search for the dangerous Crown of Sabbac leads to Adam’s awakening. Aided by the Justice Society, Adam must choose between doing good or frying people with lightning. An impossible choice for a guy who can reduce his enemies to smoldering skeletons without breaking a sweat.

Like so many live-action DC stories, Black Adam looks awful. Director Jaume Collet-Saura substitutes well-shot action for Snyder-esque slo-mo, reducing emotional beats to empty spectacle that isn’t much to look at anyway.  Rather than establish its own visual identity, Black Adam sticks to the DCEU’s trademark shoddiness, becoming yet another technically fraught entry in an aimless franchise.

But as uninspired and unimpressive as so much of Black Adam is, it does get two things right: Johnson and Pierce Brosnan. Both are excellent. Next to Johnson, Brosnan’s Doctor Fate is the only character who doesn’t look hopelessly bored. The supporting cast feels lifeless, functioning as archetypes meant to populate an emotionally devoid plot rather than elevate the material. The movie’s perfunctory nature is evident in a broader sense, too. Forced dynamics, poor writing, and clunky exposition abound; nothing about the story, its ramifications, or its relationships feels fun, organic or authentic, and its overblown climax drives this insipidness home further.

Black Adam feels less like a passion project and more like mindless table-setting; its promises are more exciting than the product itself, which isn’t difficult when you’ve engineered an entire movie to build other stories rather than stand on its own. Here’s to hoping the character’s next appearance is more memorable.